Chronological History. 



49 



nearly a degree further south, was reached. July 20th, and about 

 seven days were occupied in the journey from there to Swan River 

 Barracks, a distance of only ten miles. 



It is thus obvious not only that yast swarms reached 

 into British America in 1875, from our own country, but 

 that the young hatched there from swarms that had come 

 the previous year from the farther Northwest. 



There was, therefore, north of the 49th parallel, a repe- 

 tition of the devastation we were at the time experienc- 

 ing in the States ; the insects hatching there in bulk just 

 about the time they were leaving Texas on the wing. In 

 these facts we get an explanation of 



THE INVASION OF 1876. 



In opposition to contrary opinion widely circulated, I expressed 

 my belief, a year ago, that in Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska, first, 

 there would not hatch as many locusts in the spring as would natu- 

 rally hatch in ordinary seasons from indigenous species ; second, 

 that, compared w ith other parts of the country, those States most 

 ravaged by locusts in the spring and early summer of 1875 would 

 enjoy the greater immunity, during the same season of 1876, not 

 only from locust injuries, but from the injuries of most other nox- 

 ious insects ; that, in short, the people of the ravaged section had 

 reason to be hopeful rather than gloomy; that they certainly would 

 not suffer in any general way from locust injuries in the early 

 season ; and that the only way in which they could suffer from the 

 migrating pest was by fresh swarms, later in the year, from the far 

 Northwest.— Mo. Ent Rep. 8, 155-6. 



Like the other opinions as to the future doings of this 

 insect that I had felt warranted in expressing in an unqual- 

 ified way, this last was fully justified by subsequent events. 



From most of the so-called Western States the crop 

 returns were favorable, though the harvest was in many 

 sections impeded, as it was in 1875, by too much wet 

 weather. In no part of the country was the outlook more 

 flattering than in Western Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, 

 Iowa, and the country so seriously ravaged by locusts the 

 previous year, and the farmers throughout that section of 

 country had seldom been freer from insect ravages, or 

 4 



